The revolution will be webcast

Another fatal shooting of a citizen in Minneapolis. Senator Amy Klobuchar has identified the man killed as Alex Pretti, a 37-year-old Minneapolis man, US citizen and nurse. This footage from BBC shows the moments leading up to shooting. Note the presence of many citizens video recording all of these actions. Over 90% of Americans now own smartphones. Citizen surveillance has never been higher. Will it matter when the Trump Regime simply denies reality, despite overwhelming evidence?

Warning: this video contains distressing scenes

BBC: Video shows moments around fatal shooting in Minneapolis

The Alex Pretti murder has seen at least two witnesses - one with video evidence - lodge affidavits with District Court of Minnesota. - Tincher v. Noem (0:25-cv-04669)

The Guardian has more details of these sworn witness accounts that contradict Trump Regime’s propaganda.

The AI tools I actually use

It’s now as hard to imagine working without AI tools as it once was to imagine life before Google Search. Here’s my toolkit in early 2026: what I pay for, what I rely on daily and why.

Continue reading →

‘Repatriate the gold’: German economists advise withdrawal from US vaults Shift in relations and unpredictability of Donald Trump make it ‘risky to store so much gold in the US’, say experts The Guardian

In this Trump era, we need satire more than ever. Just don’t expect it to save democracy | Alexander Hurst The problem was identified as long ago as 2000 by the US economist Paul Krugman. He castigated the press for being “fanatically determined to seem even-handed”, to the point they were unwilling to call out outrageous untruths. “If a presidential candidate were to declare that the Earth is flat,” Krugman wrote, “you would be sure to see a news analysis under the headline Shape of the Planet: Both Sides Have a Point.” The Guardian

It’s time to upgrade the home to Matter and Thread Marxy writes about the quiet frustration of “simple” home automation. A few sunset-timed lights and voice-controlled switches should be easy, yet Wi-Fi devices are often flaky and painful to set up. A new common standard, Matter, backed by Apple and Google, promises to change that. Read on to find a smarter way.

The lie vs. the dead

“They stayed a little back, a little off the front lines.”

That’s what Trump said at Davos about America’s NATO and NATO-aligned allies in Afghanistan. Two decades of sacrifice dismissed with a casual lie.

Here’s what “a little back” looks like:

Continue reading →

The 2-minute learning hack hiding in plain sight

“I asked AI to produce a summary infographic for me… I find these easier and quicker to get initial concepts.”

My friend Steve F posted this alongside a visual breakdown of Celeste Headlee’s TED Talk on better conversations. Not a link to watch later. Not a recommendation I’d forget. A compressed, scannable summary he’d created in minutes.

Continue reading →

Fast memes beat quality journalism

A sharp piece on how today’s velocity-driven media rewards speed over substance. Om shows how fast shares and memes increasingly crowd out slower, higher-quality journalism. Velocity Is the New Authority. Here’s Why

Watching America from a Hemisphere Away

Watching USA from Melbourne, Australia it’s hard to escape the sense that something foundational has broken. Each day brings another shock. For much of the democratic world, trust is fraying fast, and the loss feels personal, because the United States once mattered enormously to us.

Continue reading →

Paul Krugman - Nobel Prize winning Economist telling it how it is with US economic prospects. Great insights in plain English.

Paul Krugman: Stop in the Name of Trump

Great tweets of history

In the past strong orators could move a nation and rally people to noble causes. When Churchill delivered his famous “On the beaches” speech to the British Parliament - 4 June 1940 it was a weighty 2,656 words. Would a ‘tweet’ work as well?

Continue reading →

Feedbin - a simple service to streamline info

I’ve recently started using Feedbin — a US$5/month service that consolidates both RSS feeds and email newsletters into one clean interface: an RSS reader. Reduces email clutter and makes my info consumption more productive.

Continue reading →